Mideast calm yields to deadly fighting

Israeli troops kill six Palestinians

Published: Monday, December 31, 2001

Associated Press

JERUSALEM (AP)  In a surge of violence that followed days of relative calm, Israeli troops killed six Palestinians in two separate confrontations Sunday evening near the border with the Gaza Strip, the military said.

The shootings came only hours after senior Israeli security officials said that attacks by Palestinian militants had dropped significantly since Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's speech two weeks ago calling for a cessation of violence.

In the first shooting, troops in an armored vehicle shot dead three Palestinians crouching about 20 yards from the perimeter fence of the Jewish settlement of Alei Sinai at the northern edge of the northern Gaza Strip, the army said.

The army initially said the Palestinians had opened fire on the troops, but later retracted the statement.

Palestinian witnesses in a nearby village said the Israeli forces fired at least four tank shells and machine guns.

Back in October, two Palestinian attackers entered the settlement and killed two Israelis before being killed themselves.

Several hours later and only a short distance away, Israeli soldiers shot and killed three armed Palestinians who had crossed Gaza's northern border and entered Israel, according to a statement issued by the office of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.

The trio was spotted by Israeli forces and ordered to halt.

One of the Palestinian gunmen opened fire, and all three were killed by Israeli return fire, Sharon's office said.

Before the two shootings, Israeli security officials had given an upbeat assessment of the ongoing battle with the Palestinians.

Defense Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer told a Cabinet meeting Sunday that the number and severity of Palestinian attacks was down for a second week in a row.

But Sharon said the Palestinians needed to do much more.

He told the Cabinet he would not reopen peace talks "as long as the Palestinians have not taken the vital steps to arrest terrorists and punish them."

Palestinian attacks  including shootings, bombings, grenade attacks, assaults and stabbings  have dropped from an average of 18 a day before Arafat's speech to 11 a day since then, the army said.

The army did not characterize those attacks, but the decline in Israeli fatalities and serious injuries has been dramatic.

A total of 37 Israelis were killed in the first half of December, before Arafat delivered his televised speech on Dec. 16.